No Road for Old Men
by Random Guise
Summary: I found an empty category for a movie I've seen. Based on the 1971 film "Two-Lane Blacktop" starring James Taylor and Dennis Wilson. The world changes - even if we don't - when time moves on (happy New Year BTW). I don't own the characters from the film and I've never street raced.


**A/N: You can't go back when the life you lived no longer exists. Life after the 1971 film "Two-Lane Blacktop".**

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No Road for Old Men

"Come on Scarecrow, give it up - I never seen you before and now you been in here three times in less than two weeks" the overweight man said while he sat at the edge of the bunk. It was late morning, but unusually quiet for the small holding cell in the Flagstaff, Arizona jail others called the drunk tank and the speaker often called his home away from home. Gary Proak would know; he had been a regular visitor to the cell, occasionally sleeping off a night of barroom shenanigans. Based on the single black eye he sported, it had been a relatively calm night devoid of any new sources of stitches or scars-in-waiting.

"I'm not from around here." Tall and thin, the thick mop of hair on top of the man was unkempt; not an uncommon condition of residents waking up in the cell. Not as many sported the strands of gray that this visitor did.

"I _know_ that. Where ya from?"

"I'm from...well, it doesn't matter because it doesn't exist anymore."

"Tore down your house. eh? Damn urban renewal. Government gets these ideas to fix everything and all it works out to is takin' from one person and givin' it to another."

"Never had a house; I pretty much lived on the road. But that road ain't out there anymore."

"No roads? Man, there's roads everywhere! They crisscross the whole town! Freeways, highways, alleys - you can't get away from 'em unless you go off into the desert in a Jeep or somethin'. Or you talkin' about one special road in particular?"

"All roads, some roads, no roads I guess. I talking about _the_ road, man. Two lanes of blacktop as long as the eye can see. Just you and your mechanic, and your opponent sitting in the lane beside you. Freedom, that's what it was. Man against man, machine against machine."

Gary leaned back and rested himself against the wall. "I get it - you're a racer. One of those hot rod types that hang out and polish their cars at the Best Bun."

"Those guys? They're nothin' but owners in my book. Me, I'm...I'm a driver. A driver don't race all the time because you gotta get from place to place. All racers are drivers, but not all drivers are racers. I never owned a can of polish in my life." He looked up and over towards Gary, revealing eyes that were lost and staring at something that wasn't even in the room; something that wasn't even anywhere, now.

Gary got a little uneasy. The man just stared into the distance and didn't speak; his fingers flexed occasionally as if gripping or holding something. It was too quiet and Gary tried to break the silence. "What happened to the road, Driver?"

The man's attention returned to the room. "Lots of things. Interstates happened; all the money they used to keep up the highways went there and potholes and weed-filled cracks took over. Concrete came in; good for mom and dad to drive across the country in their station wagon but pop the clutch and it'll break your axle like that" he said, snapping his fingers. "Catalytic converters stopped us up to where we couldn't breathe anymore. Unleaded gas that runs through our veins and makes us anemic. Too many damned stoplights every quarter mile. Pintos." His eyes lit up as he emphasized the next point "They want to put us behind fences and grandstands and put our lives on trailers hauled behind trucks that take up too much of the road."

"People ain't changed; they been making rules to fence us in since the cowboy days."

"Yeah, they're the same. Girls come and then they go, friends get killed, tow trucks drivers don't care. I guess they look at wrecked cars like doctors look at dying patients; some you save, some you give up on. You go down the road to the next town and it's all the same; just different faces."

"Whatcha drive?"

"Whatever needs drivin'. If I can't find anything I drive to the nearest bar and try to forget."

Through the window of the door a head appeared, along with the clanking of keys. The door opened and a deputy stuck his head in. "Hey Bobby, is it time already?" Gary asked the officer.

"Yeah, we're releasing you a little early today; we gotta hose down the place real good before the rodeo crowd starts filling it up" Bobby explained as he rousted the two. "You know the way to processing, Gary; lead your new friend here through the steps while I get a janitor in here."

"It pays to be a frequent flyer" Gary laughed as he led the way down the hallway. "But at least I got a home to go to after I get out. What are you gonna do?" he asked.

"Don't need to mix it up with any cowboys" the driver said, thinking about it. "Probably move on."

"Well, let me ask you a question before I get out of here. Whenever you get behind the wheel, do you ever think about dying?"

The driver hesitated only a moment. "Nah, I died a long time ago; I'm only waiting to see which junkyard they haul the wreckage to" he said as he shook his head slowly.

The End

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**A/N: This movie was filmed almost 50 years ago, but I only saw it in 2016; as a car kid growing up I think the subtlety of the film would have escaped me anyway. I considered sprinkling some James Taylor song titles into the dialogue, but decided it wouldn't fit the somber tone of the movie and story. But I could have.**

**For the record, I may not have driven a 1955 Chevy 150 but I _have_ driven a Pinto. They're almost the same, right?**


End file.
